Religion Dispatches
…e people who really struggle. “I’m thinking of the people in nursing homes today, who don’t know if they’re going be able to pay for the cost of being there. … I think of the people who may be losing their houses. I can’t even imagine the fear and the concern that’s out there today, because these big powerful politicians wanted to spend our money with no limit.” I think what’s most frustrating about this comment is, not only did Dobson… vote for t…
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…w Deal. In the pages of Christianity Today (the fundamentalist namesake of today’s popular evangelical magazine), Machen likened explaining the Constitution to President Roosevelt to explaining color to a blind man. But his concerns went beyond the President. When the Supreme Court upheld New Deal assistance to debtors in 1934 in Home Building & Loan Ass’n v. Blaisdell, Machen was despondent. “Chief Justice Hughes and his four associates have decl…
Read More…to a veritable boom in the quarrying industry were that still the practice today). The same for homosexuals. And the biblical conditions for divorce are so strict that a woman could be beaten within an inch of her life and still not be allowed to legally separate. The point is that nobody in the mainstream Christian church today would argue any of these propositions. A hundred years ago, that was not necessarily the case. In other words, the defin…
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…tinues. “But, Paige, this is your most defiant act of protest yet, because today, you make a public declaration that you are a child of God. Are you ready to be renamed and reclaimed in the name of Jesus?” Paige’s answer? “Absolutely.” A few episodes later, after she does a little more snooping and Elizabeth gently begins to try to tell her about their lives by taking her on a field trip to an impoverished, largely African-American neighborhood wh…
Read More…the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office, said, “We are disappointed with today’s decision. It is unacceptable for employers – especially for-profit companies – to use their personal beliefs as an excuse to deny critical health coverage to the people who work for them.” She added, “This is not religious freedom, this is discrimination. Real religious liberty gives everyone the right to make their own decisions about their own health, including wh…
Read More…theist is criticizing her for the wrong reasons.) This week, in advance of today’s Georgetown speech, Ryan received a letter from 90 professors, led by Georgetown’s Thomas Reese, S.J., telling him “your budget appears to reflect the values of your favorite philosopher, Ayn Rand, rather than the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Her call to selfishness and her antagonism toward religion are antithetical to the Gospel values of compassion and love.” In respo…
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…rket. But it does seem that the two opposing traditions have come together today to act as a powerful rhetoric of gratitude as indebtedness. Today we have a thriving self-help industry that churns out a steady stream of books on pop psychology, happiness, and gratitude. How well do these grapple with the issues you’ve raised? I was a little surprised by how little attention is paid to the history of gratitude in the self-help literature. I see my…
Read More…other laws – especially regarding harassment – outside abortion clinics.” Today’s decision is limited to the 2007 Massachusetts law, and may not invalidate every buffer zone law currently on the books or that could be enacted in the future. The ruling leaves in place a 2000 decision upholding a Colorado law that imposed a 100 foot buffer zone outside all health care facilities, barring people from coming within eight feet of visitors to counsel t…
Read More…he religious beliefs of some dictate the deprivation of rights for others. Today the Coalition Against Religious Discrimination (CARD) is calling on Obama to honor this week’s anniversary of President Franklin Roosevelt’s signing of an executive order prohibiting racial discrimination by military contractors, by finally putting an end to a Bush-era executive order that permits religious organizations receiving federal grants to discriminate in hir…
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…central place that religion and congregating religiously still holds among today’s immigrants. In contrast to Levitt’s focus on religious activities across borders, Kniss and Numrich examine several congregations in one area. They look at similarities and differences in moral authority, moral project, and sectarian inclinations among Roman Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Hindu, and Buddhist congregations in Chicago. Throu…
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